Genesis faced an uphill climb after Phil Collins quit the group, but replacement singer Ray Wilson wishes they'd stuck with it at least a little longer.

Wilson, who came in to record 1997's Calling All Stations LP after Collins announced his departure from the lineup the previous year, tells Eonmusic that his version of the band was just hitting its stride after it finished the subsequent tour — only for guitarist Mike Rutherford to hit the brakes.

"When I signed my contract to join the band, it was for two albums. It was always the idea to do the first and then go from there, but Mike Rutherford changed his mind – that’s exactly what happened," said Wilson. "I think he felt he didn’t have the stamina to do another one. All of a sudden you’re faced with going from 15 million albums' sales to two and a half, and I think he couldn’t find it in himself to do the next one."

Wilson's observations echo statements made by Rutherford himself. "I enjoyed the process of making Calling All Stations," he later explained. "What happened was that, suddenly, the mood changed and I sort of felt that going forward to create a new Genesis required too much work. I just didn’t have it in me, and I had the Mechanics. I know that Tony and Ray wanted to carry on, but I just knew I couldn’t do it."

For Wilson, the sudden end to his brief time in Genesis remains a source of disappointment — particularly since it's made it easier for Banks and Rutherford to, as he sees it, sweep that period of the band's history "under the carpet." Unlikely as it might have been for this lineup to duplicate the impact achieved during Collins' tenure, he still wishes they could have at least made the attempt.

"It’s a great shame," he said of the lack of a Calling All Stations follow-up. "Even if it hadn’t been very good, we didn’t need to release it, but we should have at least sat down together and continued the process, because I think we really became a band after the tour."